Pfizer Ad Spreads Misinformation

I am working on an explosive piece that features interviews with a highly-placed figure. It will most likely post early next week. Stay tuned…

In the meantime, I came across this Pfizer ad and immediately knew something was wrong. A brief fact check follows.

Dave

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A Pfizer ad on Twitter claims that 3 out of 4 US adults are at “high risk” for severe Covid-19.

This ad is highly misleading or, arguably, outright false.

Problem 1: What is “high” risk?

We don’t know because Pfizer doesn’t define it.

The graphic in the ad cites a study as the source of its claim “3 out of 4 US adults are at high risk for severe Covid-19.” Except the study never uses the term “high risk.” Rather, the study is on people at “increased risk.”

“Increased risk,” of course is quite different from “high risk.” Obviously, high risk is worse than merely increased risk. I need not explain why Pfizer would choose language in its ad that exaggerates the risk of Covid.

Problem 2: The cited study itself doesn’t even define “increased risk.” Does that mean a 0.1% increase, a 1% increase, 20% increase, 1000% increase? On this point, the study includes the following caveat: “the effect size of each risk factor was not taken into account in our analysis, so this report does not address degree of risk. Effect estimates of severe COVID-19 risk factors are widely variable and ultimately unreliable.”

Digging a little deeper, the study links to a CDC webpage that gives a list of conditions for people who are “more likely to get very sick with COVID-19” and uses “higher risk,” “increased risk,” “greater risk” and “high risk” in its text, seemingly interchangeably. The page gives a long list of medical conditions—from cancer to diabetes to depression. Still, we don’t know what “more likely” or “increased risk” actually means. This webpage, in turn, links to another CDC webpage that describes “Underlying Medical Conditions Associated with Higher Risk for Severe COVID-19.”

We’ve gone from the scary “high” risk (not defined), to “increased” risk (also not defined), to “higher risk.” How is “higher risk” defined? Here is what the page says:

Higher risk is defined as an underlying medical condition or risk factor that has a published meta-analysis or systematic review or underwent the CDC systematic review process. The meta-analysis or systematic review demonstrates a conclusive increase in risk for at least one severe COVID-19 outcome.

So we are now three layers deep and we still don’t have a quantifiable definition for what, exactly, “high,” “increased,” or “higher” even means, nor a clear differentiation of what the first study acknowledges is a wide variability in estimates of risk factors. I’m sure there is a quantifiable threshold defined somewhere, but I stopped digging because this isn’t even the main problem.

Problem 3 (the main problem): The data from the cited study in the Pfizer ad saying 3 out of 4 US adults are at high (aka increased) risk of severe Covid are from 2015-2018. But this ad is being run in July 2023—after nearly the entire population has either already been infected, vaccinated, or both, each circumstance, we have been told, decreases one’s risk of severe Covid. In other words, Pfizer’s own ad suggests that prior infection and vaccination have not reduced the number of people at high risk of severe Covid. Does Pfizer want us to believe that its product—the vaccine—did not lower the rate of people at high risk of severe Covid?

The fact is, 3 out of 4 US adults are not at “high” risk of severe Covid. This statement is based on data from before accounting for the protective effect of infection and vaccination. Moreover, “high risk” is not defined and appears to simply be a made up description.

We’ve heard a lot about “misinformation” in the past few years. Generally, the government and media have pointed the finger at so-called “anti-vaxxers” and “conspiracy theorists.” A critical spotlight from the government has rarely seemed to shine on claims made by Pfizer. Advertisements like this misinform and unnecessarily scare people, perhaps pushing some of them into taking additional doses of the vaccine, or therapeutics like Paxlovid (also made by Pfizer), that have potential harms, and for many people, especially now, without clear benefit.